


Cultural Misunderstandings

by BravoSierraTango (SkiraDeCorvus)



Series: Tales of passion [2]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Cultural Differences, Emotions, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Reverse Big Bang Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-11
Updated: 2017-04-11
Packaged: 2018-10-17 18:12:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10599438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkiraDeCorvus/pseuds/BravoSierraTango
Summary: A cultural misunderstanding leads to suffocation, hurt and comfort in the end.This is part of a series (it is not really required to read part one, but it might help you to understand it better where the dependency is comming from)Art will be posted online at the frostiron reversebang. Please excuse possible issues with the formatting. I suspect I wil have to look at the issue again.LOVE ALL OF YOU!!





	

**Author's Note:**

> First off I want to thank the host of the reversebang. She (I suppose it’s a she) is a really great person and fun to write emails with. All the time and brainpower she invests into this project is amazing and should be honored.
> 
> I would also like to send a big hug to my artist. I really love her picture so please make sure to send her all the love you can!
> 
> To the story: I wanted to write sex (first time. Not theirs but mine you dirty, dirty mind!) and smut and more smut and..yes, I know..I have a problem, I should get it checked out, but I can just live fine with it…to be honest, it did not really work out. I am still a beginner at this and would like to invite all of you to a virtual glass of wine as I had several exhausting weeks behind me – since yesterday it is for sure: I worked myself into a promotion! So…sorry for a rather short story but I really had to work my ass off for this.

Cultural misunderstanding

It was a Thursday evening when Pepper Potts, the always superior and eloquent manager of Stark Industries banged shut the big wooden doors with a thunderous noise, turned around on the stubbles of her stilettos and blocked the door handles with her whole body. Fury, followed by an embarrassed smile crossed her face when the stockholders behind her looked nonplussed at her.

“Mister Stark is unfortunately just working on a highly confidential project at the moment. I am sorry to detour our tour, but I am sure..”, her heated gaze hit Happy “..he will wind that up for you in a second. You know him, always working, but I can assure you. It will raise our stocks significantly when the project is finished. It is pulverizing the known technology. In the meantime I will show you his private labs – of course JARVIS is monitoring everything there, so please do not touch anything.”, she courteously led the elderly men and women down the corridor , ignoring their sour faces and not without tapping away on her phone.  
Anticipating a message Happy took his phone out of his pocket and stared at the screen. It did not even take a whole minute – that woman was quick with her fingers.  
‘Tell Tony that I will KILL him if he is still in there in 20 minutes. And no, I don’t care what he says. Get them OUT!’, the text said and Happy sighed in defeat before banging his fist to the door of the laboratory when he was sure that the others were  
“Tony! The stakeholders are here! Pepper wants to show them the lab! Get your naked asses out of there.”, he insisted but there was no answer.  
“Tony! Do not make me open that door!”, he tried again and hoped that he would not really have to open the door. The last time he barged into a room – the main conference room, mind you - on his hunt for Tony, he saw things. Things he never wanted to see again…if Tony was in the scene. But now he knew just how agile Loki was and that the Kama Sutra should have been written by the old norse gods or that perverted magician himself. Impressive, inspiring but traumatizing nonetheless. How that was even anatomically possible, Happy would never understand. But then it could not hurt to have clones to assist you. And Pepper would NEVER do that. What a shame.

“Tony! I swear, I will activate the sprinkler system. Just you try to keep going through a hailstorm of cold water down your asscrack!”, he threatened louder while kicking the door for good measure. And finally there it was. The feeling of licking a 200 Volt battery in his mouth, his hair standing on edge and a general need to go hide somewhere and pray to not be found by whatever was chasing you – Happy hated it, but he was used to it. And THAT said everything about Tony’s tendency to fuck Loki wherever inappropriate they could find and Peppers tendency to call for Happy to clear them out.  
“Not the labs downstairs! Pepper went there!!”

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

It happened on a monday evening, Tony balls deep in Loki’s ass when the distinctive sound of a trigger being pulled back reached his ears.  
“The options: One, you get out of my rooms. Two, I shoot you. Preferably both of you, but I suppose I’d have to settle for you Stark.”, a female voice offered and Tony stilled. Crap..caught with his fingers in the cooky jar..or his dick in Loki’s ass. Same is same.

“Not that I’d even believe for a second that you would shoot gorgeous me, but I smell a third option.”, he countered while trying to catch his breath again, Lokis green half lidded eyes on his, sweat running down his temples into that black hair that smelled so deliciously like everything Loki. Just below his hairline marks visible that screamed to be renewed and bitten until they would almost bleed again. Tony knew that Natasha’s eyes were black with arousal at the moment, he could smell her. That little Russian assassin was a connoisseur of the finer things, whatever else one could say about her. And what finer was out there than Loki in the throes of passion, almost out of his mind, grabbing at Tony and gyrating his hips in blind passion since Tony dared to tone it down to light thrusts every once in a while, chasing his lust?

“There is indeed. Share.”, she offered generously and reached out a hand towards Loki who still could not focus his eyes for more than three seconds. Tony stilled completely before swatting her hand away. He could share Loki, hell, at the moment he was riding his usual magical-something-sex-high and Tony could order him about anything and he would gladly do it. It was always like this when they ‘merged’, as Loki liked to call it for his magically-stupid-mortal lover.

Tony knew that Loki got an enormous boost out of their sex, his magic vibrating just below his skin and reaching out to Tony every time they even just so much as touched each other and flaring with new energy. And Tony himself got the best and most intense sex ever out of this arrangement. But as much as he tried to tell himself that it was just that – mindblowing sex – he could not fight the feelings that slowly crept into his soul.  
Only when Loki let go of an unrestricted and heated groan under him and Natasha took a cautious step back did his mind catch up with his body. He. Just. Fucking. Growled. At. Natasha. And he did not care about that. Nobody except him would touch Loki.

Natasha regained her composure quicker than anticipated and settled in a chair opposite of them.  
“Can I at least watch? It is my kitchen after all.”, she asked neutrally and everything in Tony approved of having a spectator to his siege over this marvelous being under him. Something in him tried to tell him that he was not acting appropriately but he stomped it down.

“Gladly.”, he hissed before taking advantage of Loki’s presented throat and sinking his teeth exactly where they belonged and getting his hips back into the action.

Tony was so focused on his lover that he did not hear her scream when she finally came, brought to completion by either her own fingers or that blast of energy the two of them usually created whenever they came together. Their magic entwining, connecting and feeding each other and stomping into creation something that should not be allowed to exist in this universe for the blink on an eye, before drifting off to an other dimension where it would be welcomed.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

It was Friday night and it was a gala dinner – hosted of course by Stark Industries – to celebrate…something. Tony was not even sure why he was invited. Lately Pepper tended to officially uninvite him whenever possible. Her official reason was that he just could not keep his hands to himself whenever Loki was near him. True, but still, it was his company. And if that connection between him and Loki was something beyond everything reasonable and logical, well…if Tony could live with it, then everybody else just could suck it up and shut up about it. 

Loki was not even here at the moment which annoyed Tony even more than the speech Mr. whoever-important-you-might-seem-to-think-you-are held now. After only about 20 minutes at the gala dinner he interrupted Tony’s chat with one of the guests, excused himself in a short fashion and hurried off to who knows where. Most likely the library. Maybe the attention he got from some of their guests who tried to slither up to him was too much, or he just did not feel like conversing with some low mortals today. 

Tony did not really pay it much thought and kept on chatting with everybody just like in the old times. One or two (or twelve) women even tried their luck with him, flirting and throwing around suggestive sentences. Poor girls did not know that he was off the market and had something between the sheets that would make them shriek in indignation, were they ever to witness one of their encounters. 

Nevertheless Tony enjoyed the attention he got from some of the most beautiful women in the room and everybody he cared for already knew that this was nothing they had to think about twice. The first time in his life Tony Stark was really faithful to somebody and he felt comfortable with it. Even Pepper and Happy, that soppy couple, commented on it.

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Saturday morning everything good in his life took a turn for the worse when Tony went back to his penthouse after the gala and saw himself confronted with a closed bedroom door, silence from Loki and an enraged god of thunder in his livingroom who threatened to end his existence with his bare hands and some very creative usage of spoons.  
“Jarvis! Deploy the armor!”, he shouted while sprinting around the room and hopping over his own furniture to avoid these big, strong Asgardian hands that tried to grab him.

“Thor! Thor! Oh my good!”, Tony squeeked (yes, he squeeked. So sue him and let’s take a good look at how you would sound in that situation!) and dove headlong behind the Canapé praying to Jarvis that the stupid armor would finally arrive. 

“Sir, Mark XI is being readied and will arrive in two minutes. Meanwhile I took the liberty to activate the weaponry in the room sir.”, Jarvis announced before slots in the ceiling opened and the big repulsor guns came to live with a deep whirring sound before focusing in on Thor who really stopped pursuing Tony and switched to growling at him from the other side of the Canapé.  
“Thank you Jarvis! You’re the best! Thank you, thank you,..”, Tony wheezed out of breath and crawled to the wall behind him to slump down against it. Generally he was in a quite good shape but being chased by a god of thunder still seemed to be a bit too much for his mortal body.

“It would be a shame to lose you now sir. And even if I can understand the reaction you provoked Mr. Odinson into, I can not tolerate his wish to integrate your body into the walls of this building. Miss Potts would be most cross with him for such action and I do not think Mister Laufeyson would be that much more pleased with the end of your existence when and if he realizes the nature of this misunderstanding in the future.”, Jarvis’ voice stated and damn Tony, but he smelled a pause there, made from his AI just for the sole purpose of questions from either Tony or Thor. 

“There is no misunderstanding! The man of Iron behaved dishonestly against my brother and will be punished for his transgression by me as it is my right to defend my brother!”, Thor shouted without moving more than a muscle. Look at that, repulsor guns seemed to be something even Thor did not want to be on the wrong side of.

“I did no such thing! I did nothing at all! The fuck are you talking about!?”, Tony shouted and stood up when he heard the telltale noises of his Mark XI arriving. Smooth as always the armory folded around Tony and gave him back this special sense of security that Thor so brutally destroyed before.

“I am talking about the fact that I was stupid enough to let you even lay a hand on him! I should have dragged him away from you when I had the chance to do so before you were able to drag him down with you, before you could lay your claim on him and then betray him just like that! He was given a last chance by my father to prove himself worthy to live his life and he was willing to take it, to take a step back from the abyss of his minds madness and at least try to keep on living. And then you just had to destroy everything!”, Thor got more and more enraged, even to the point of twitching with his fingers in the direction of his hammer.

Tony had to make the decision now. Shoot Thor or try to reason with him. The first option would surely not help to improve Thor’s mood and would most likely end in severe damage to the tower and/or Thor and Tony. To be honest, the second option did not look especially promising at the moment.

“Everybody knows that I am a genius, but you my friend are still not making any damn sense here! I didn’t do anything to your brother. At least nothing he didn’t ask for oh so prettily…”, and Tony realized this as the exact second Thor lost it a moment too late. Damn him and his mouth. 

The static cackling all around him was the first and the last warning he got before the mother of all lightning strikes hit the building and bathed everything in a bright white light. For a second Tony was sure he would be blinded even through the visual interface of Mark XI, but then everything faded to black. And with everything, he really meant everything. Even the integrated interfaces in his walls flickered out and Tony was 100% sure that Jarvis was offline. Which also meant that the repulsor guns were offline. And to add insult to injury also his armor did not absorb the enormous energy like last time Thor hit him with the hammer. Well, it tried to as it seemed but this was on a completely other level of energy output. A slight smell of burnt electronics filled the suit and grew stronger by the second.

“System overload. Emergency shutdown.”, his armor stated before activating the emergency release and more or less spitting him out into the open field. Right in front of Thor’s feet. Not good, not good at all. Tony felt like a bug under a shoe, ready to be crushed. 

“You hurt my brother. Now I will hurt you.”, Thor growled and heaved him off the floor at the collar. Desperately Tonys hands shot up and tried to break free without much success. At least Thor left him the ability to breathe this time but why, why had these Asgardian assholes always had to go for his throat?? Every single one of them!

“I didn’t do anything Thor! And your brother can look after himself just fine, believe me. Whatever you think I did to him, don’t you think that he would make me suffer for it just fine without your help?”, he wheezed and kept on kicking at Thor with his legs.

Thors face came impossible closer, his blue eyes boring into his with honest confusion.  
“You really do not see your fault, do you?”, he asked almost astonished by his realization. Tony chose the nonverbal and air-saving method to answer and shook his head in denial.

“I want to believe you Man of Iron, that you did not hurt my brother knowingly or intentionally as I do not take you as a man who wants to hurt the ones that opened up their hearts to him.”, Thor began now noticeable softer in his tone, but still, the grip on his collar did not lessen.

“I’d never do that Thor. But I sense that there is something we should talk about as soon as possible. And as interesting as it is to finally be on eyelevel with you, would you please consider to let me stand on my own two feet for that?”, Tony suggested and hoped that he finally found a way to avoid imminent death. Again Thors eyes zoomed in on his and this unnerving steely stare seemed to penetrate him for a few moments before ever so slowly he was granted his wish.

“Thank you buddy….really. Thank you for not killing me.”, the inventor said and rubbed at his throat to relieve the stress in his muscles. Thor kept quiet, scrutinizing him like a bug under a microscope even when Tony wandered off to his bar and grabbed two glasses.  
Whatever they would be talking about, he would SO need alcohol for this conversation, he was sure about that.

“I’ll let the whole “opened up his heart”-phrase go as an Asgardian way to say…” he swiveled the scotch in his glass in a nondescript gesture around “something else as I really do not see me in a position to discuss something like that today and would settle for an explanation why you tried to strangle me to death for a transgression I was not even aware of. And for that I need a drink. You too?”, Tony tried to joke a bit but when Thor cast his eyes almost embarrassed to the floor he knew he was in for a long night.

“You gotta be shitting me…”, Tony cussed and grabbed the whole bottle almost desperately before joining Thor at the canapé and slumping down in the soft cushions.  
“To make one thing clear: the following sentence is not to be interpreted literally by you but….hit me with it.”, Tony said resigned and emptied the first glass of scotch in one go before also emptying Thor’s glass and refilling both of them. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

On Saturday around lunchtime if the sun was anything to go by (which it most likely was always), Tony Stark stared with glassy eyes at a beet-red god of thunder on the other side of his white sofa. Yes, it was a sofa. The fucking french word for it was just beyond his grasp…no wonder after the second bottle of…something in his hand.

“Try to remember Stark. Did you ever see my brother engage in something more than a light chat with anybody ever since the two of you are sharing a bed?”, the god finally asked after a few seconds of silence and caught Tony completely off guard with this statement.  
“Um, no. But in my defense, I also never saw him flirting before. More like “Arrrr, lowly mortal scum, I will subjugate you all”. Well…maybe – and that’s a big maybe – he flirted a tiny bit with me before throwing me out the window..you know…while grabbing my throat. Must run in the family.” Tony chattered on and on.

“Stark! For everything holy to you, cease your babbling and concentrate! First: my brother does NOT talk like that! Second: you are just so tiny that the only thing we can comfortably grasp is your throat!” – and just when drunken Tony wanted to counter this insult indignantly – “And third: I really do not want to know anything about you and my brother! Please stop hinting at things and please stop trying to send me videos of … whatever it is the two of you are doing! And now: concentrate! I should not have let you drink that much. Give me that glass!”, Thor insisted and attempted to take the scotch away. But even drunken Tony knew how to protect his scotch.  
“No, I need that to function at this point! Don’t you dare to take my alcohol away!”, he screamed and almost made a most impressive backroll over his sofa before sobering up again and getting quiet.

“ I just thought he…doesn’t like it when people come too near…or something. I never thought about it that way.”, again silence stretched between them almost unbearably long.

“You guys really take a partner for life and shut out everybody else? Not even flirting to feel..I don’t know…appreciated, sexy?”, Tony asked, eyes down on the floor, scotch clutched to his chest. Man, he fucked up in this case. He flirted with everything. Not even a biro would be safe. He did not need to see Thor, to know that he confirmed the statement.

“One moment big guy. As far as the lore goes, Loki already has several children. How did that happen then?”, Tony asked a bit riled up. Was he being played here?!? A second later Thors face fell and that stony expression came back. So this was an other faux pas, just great. What did he do wrong now?

“Let’s just say that my brother did not really have a say in the conception of these children – although he loved and loves them with all of his heart, please do not misinterprete a conception with eternal love for the other parent. He did love Sigyn in his own way, but this relationship was forced upon both of them. The only thing that kept them together, and forced them apart in the end, were their children. As for my brothers other offspring…also they can be sure of his eternal love and support if ever needed. But they were not his choice. Mother had to console him for months afterwards each time.”, Thor whispered with obvious hurt in his voice and that right there stopped any question Toy might have had completely.

Just listening to Thor for about ten hours straight made the genius’s head spin and he had started wondering after only two hours why not both of them had gone insane right after being integrated into this fucked up family. There were so many expectations, rules to follow and orders to obey that Tony would really like to have Jarvis up and running again just to keep count of them. This was so not what Tony would have expected from the life of two princes. 

“I see..and I promise you to not bring up this subject if I can avoid it. But just to defuse any bomb of this sort of cultural misunderstanding in the future, would you be inclined to explain at least the most important parts of your culture to me? As you might understand, things are really different here on earth and I really want this..thing..between your brother and me to work out. I do not want him to close himself up, I do not want him hurt and I do not want him to question my loyalty when it comes to him. But Thor, I am just a human. Even in the best case scenario I will only have another twenty or thirty years left. Not counting all the possible deaths I might die while in my gear. Maybe I am not really the best option to bind his heart to.”, Tony voiced his concerns but Thor just smiled with his big mouth full of straight white teeth.

“What? My death amuses you? Really?”, Tony inquired suspiciously.  
“Nothing Antony, nothing. Nothing that has to concern you as of now.”, Thor answered and slapped his hand on his back. Tony almost spit out his scotch. So they were on friendship level again no matter how hurtful that was for Tony. One had to be said about the thunderer. He could switch your status from friend to foe to friend within a day more times than a manic depressed changed his mood. Well, he was the last one to complain about being on the good side of Thor.

“So. To sum this up. I will not flirt with others and you are going to teach me anything else that is important. And from there Loki and I will have to take it and work together. But to be honest…he could be off worse. At least I did not knock him up until now..”….damn his mouth!!!!

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Saturday afternoon repeated what Saturday morning already thought was more than entertaining but he added some more body contact.

Tony flailed on the sofa, scotch bottle already broken on Thors head without much more than a flinch from the god, Thor sitting almost on Tony with his hands around his neck again in earnest.  
And then, finally, a voice cut through the gurgling and hissing.

“Thor! I do not want to repeat myself. Get off him!”, Loki ordered from the door of their shared bedroom but Tony missed a certain urgency in the order that should be there when a god tried to strangle a mortal.

Thor did not loosen up his hands one bit. Asgardian shovel talk meant business with real shovels as it seemed. Then, suddenly, the familiar green light Tony associated with Loki engulfed Thor and lifted him off Tony, Lokis fingers dancing next to his legs without much effort. Oh yes, that was sexy.

“You sure took your sweet time princess. Glad to have finally enticed you out of the bedroom.”, Tony grinned. Was it his fault that Thor could not understand a joke?

“I am not in the mood for your jests Antony. Be silent!”, Loki ordered and Tony shrunk back as far as he could.  
“And you!”, Loki focused on Thor and dropped him unceremoniously on the floor when his magic dissipated.  
“Sit down and be silent you oaf. Can’t I take my eyes of you for even a few hours before you wander off and try to kill anybody?”, Loki addressed his brother before sitting down himself next to Tony.

“Brother! I just wanted to..”, Thor started but snapped his mouth shut after Loki cast a glance at him. 

“I know what you wanted. I heard you. And before you ask, no I did not eavesdrop, but your voice would not be hindered by a simple wall. Now be silent and don’t move a muscle or I will bind you with my magic!”, he hissed and turned back to Tony.

“But I have to confess, I was infuriated by your actions over the last few weeks. I tried to accept it when you flaunted around..the more intimate parts of our relationship. I even tried to rationalize your way to talk to Pepper and more or less any other person you met. But it hurt each time that you would not value our relationship more. But in the end it was my fault to hold you to the conditions that are expected by Asgard. Or, that are expected of me if only by my status as a mage and prince of the realm eternal.”, Loki lifted his hand, elegant slim fingers curling over Tony’s jawbone and caressing it lovingly. A nice contrast to the handling it had gotten the rest of the day.

“And I am sorry that I am a stupid, ignorant mortal. I am sorry that I hurt you so much. I am sorry that I am me. I vow to change but you have to help me. We have to change together. I can not walk all the way alone.”, Tony whispered and closed the gap between them to join in a slow kiss. Nothing hurried, no passion, only their deeper than expected feelings for each other.

“If you want to be, you can be a stupid, ignorant immortal. Then we would have more time to work on your shortcomings, and your values my love.”, Loki whispered against Tonys lips while his body foldet itself more comfortably against the inventor, using every inch to be as close as possible to each other.

It took two more minutes before Thors resolve to not move or talk flinched and even Lokis threat to bind him with magic did not keep him still anymore.  
“Brother! Please! Can I move now? I can not sit here a second longer!”, he begged desperately.


End file.
